Fighting talk - another week of shame

Two figures from opposite sides of the celebrity sphere are in court in England this week, both facing allegations of violence.

England and Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard has admitted hitting a reveller in a nightclub in Liverpool after a row over music - although the star footballer is insisting the act was self-defence. While across the country in London, Back to Black singer Amy Winehouse has appeared in court to face charges of hitting a woman who had asked her for a photograph.

Now celebrities in court is nothing new, but while we are used to the usual forays into drug use, drink driving and the like, acts of violence are not so common.

There are so many examples of famous celebrity brawls that I can't list them all here. The first two that spring to mind are Liam Gallagher and Jamiroquai's hat-wearing JK lashing out at photographers in the 90s. But it's usually a day's worth of blurred and bloodied photographs in the tabloids and doesn't end up in court.

Drugs and wild nights flashing your boobs are one thing. But it is a sad state of affairs to see two young (29 and 25) role models in court for punching and hitting members of the public.

Maybe they need a dose of their own medicine and someone could knock some sense into them both?

Moon landing hoax - shame on you!

It is the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing this week.

Newspapers and news programmes in the UK (and I assume throughout the world) have been full of pictures, interviews and features of the historic landing.

A quick search on the internet will come up with millions (maybe billions?) of sites, articles and videos exploring the event.

However, by now, the "One small step for man" speech is as synonymous with the great feet of human and technological endurance as it is with the 'Moon Landing Hoax'.

Did man really walk on the moon in 1969? Was the technology there? Why are the shadows wrong on the pictures?

While this is not a post to attempt to come to a conclusion on this debate, or explore my own thoughts on the matter, I would like to just say one thing. Will these documentary makers please leave the poor astronauts alone!!

I googled 'did we really land on the moon' this morning while I was having my coffee and found a video of this fat American chasing poor old (and they are all old now) astronauts to get them to swear on the bible that they went to the moon/walked on the moon/walked in space/whatever.
These poor guys, who had no doubt been fantastic pilots and scientists before joining Nasa went on to risk life and limb to further mankind's exploration of space.

Whatever your beliefs on the moon hoax row, the astronauts are not to blame. Why aren't these guys chasing down Nasa, or the government? It was really sad to see film crews chasing these poor, bewildered old men. Shame on you!

If you are reading this please help!

I have swine flu. I'm sure of it.

I can't go out in case I infect a pregnant woman who will not be able to visit crowded public places, and I can't live with that on my conscience.

So I am locked up in my flat, washing my hands repeatedly between key strokes. They are starting to get raw and rashed (my hands that is, not my keyboard) and this post is taking a very long time to type as my bathroom is down the hall.

I have a pair of knickers wrapped around my head like a face mask. Don't worry, they are clean.

I rang the NHS helpline but they said I was not to come to the doctors or go to the pharmacy for my tamiflu tablets. Instead I was to ask an uninfected, healthy friend to go and pick them up for me.

But I have no friends. Or a letter box, so even if I did have a friend I would risk infecting them too, jeopardising our relationship and ending my one and only contact with society in my otherwise sad and insular life.

The food is starting to run out and soon I will be reduced to opening the tin of pilchards in tomato sauce I won in a summer fete tombola last year. What else goes with Bovril?

If you are reading this please help!

Like buses.. and all that (always make sure you have clean nickers on in case you get run over by one)

I've been very busy this week with two comedy performances in the space of three days.

I have know about both gigs for more than a month, so in typical 'me' style, was up into the wee hours the night before the first one panicking over what material to do. I eventually staggered to bed completely exhausted - still no closer to sorting out my set - and spent the entire day leading up to the gig stressing about what to do.

Tonight (being the night before the next gig) is set to be the same.

What puzzles me is that I am usually a very organised and prepared person. As a journalist you have to be organised to work towards deadlines. If anything, I am usually accused of over-organising things; nights out, which pubs we meet in, where we go next etc. etc. I am constantly reminding myself to relax and 'go with the flow'.

But when it comes to this comedy stuff, I seem to put it off until the last possible moment. I think, it maybe has something to do with the fact that I am absolutely petrified of getting on stage.

It's like a mental block when it comes to being on stage in front of people. I put the 'normal, sensible, organised me' in a little box and pack it away in the corner of my brain and this sweaty, panicky, disorganised, mess of a person takes over.

Oh, I've just read that last bit back. Isn't that schizophrenia? Yes EW, yes it is. So is answering your own questions on your blog.

And the day started so well..... can I get off now please driver? This is my stop.

Looking after the pennies

As I was sipping my cold morning coffee this afternoon there was a programme on BBC Radio 4 about the battle of the discount stores.

Pound shops, we were dully informed to the background noise of (I assume) goods being packed in plastic bags and other assorted 'general shop noises', are popping up everywhere on our high streets.

The bastard love child of a broken economy and an indebted population, they are about the only retail outlets that seem to be 'bucking the trend' of declining consumers amid the recession, by selling bags of jelly tots and packs of dishcloths at incredibly low prices.

But even among the lowest of the low (ok, so the nice lady presenter might have said cheapest of the cheap, but she said it in such a way that it sounded like lowest of the low) there is a retail war going on, as pound shops are undercut by 99p stores.

And now, the new kid on the cheap block is the 89p store.

The lady presenter interviewed the owner/manager of a pound store on a high street where one of these 89p stores had opened up the road. The pound store had seen a decided downturn in trade since the 89p joint opened. This confused the well-spoken Radio 4 woman, who seemed flabbergasted (in her Queen's English) that consumers really would turn their backs on a store "for the sake of a few pence".

And herein, finally, lies my point. "For the sake of a few pence" spat the well-spoken, middle England, daddy's little girl presenter. What, to a woman who's father owns Rolls Royce, or Dunlop, or the local country club, or whatever, is 11 miserly pence?

Why, she probably doesn't even save her coppers anymore, she's the sort of person who can count pound coins as loose change and simply discards the coppers and silvers right there on the street like a cigarette butt or a finished chewing gum.

While most of us are lucky to have survived this recession relatively unscathed (most of us still have jobs, a roof over our heads and can afford to feed ourselves, even if it is the cheaper stores-own brands these days) to a lot of people - are you listening Radio 4 - 11 pence is still 11 pence. Of course you're going to take a few extra steps down the high street if you can get your set of 20 disposable lighters and broken biscuits pack cheaper.

It smacks of "let them eat cake" syndrome, and until it can be beat out of the middle and upper class mentality (preferably with a big, hard stick) then we are never going to get over this recession.

Match point

Like the heartbroken victim of a cheap kiss-and-tell tabloid romp, I have been keeping a dignified silence of late, content to lurk with intent on an array of familiar blogs - and take the time to venture tentatively into some hitherto uncharted territory.

Many events have been reported on in the public arena since my last post, but I am looking to the future now, so for anyone expecting a "here's what's happened so far since the three minute advert break for all of you who are too stupid to remember what the show you have been watching for the last hour is about" you can switch over now.

Green lawns and red strawberries have been the order of the day this week, as the crinkle-free white-clad athletes of the tennis world grunt it out for the Wimbledon crown.

In the UK, our great hope, Andy Murray, takes to the courts tomorrow (Friday) and by the time you read this may have already won or lost his game, set and match, dashing a nation's hopes against the white-topped net of despair.

But I'm sure life, like this blog, will go on.

Once again I seem to be failing

For anyone who cares, this is the second time I have started a blog and failed to keep up with it.

Both attempts were for fun, an excuse to write and to be published - of sorts. But I just don't know how regular bloggers find the time to keep up with it. There just aren't enough hours in my day!

Plus, I don't think you can become a blogger if you read other people's blogs first (I think it works the other way around though).

I got into blogging because I read a few blogs regularly and decided to give it a go, the problem is, the blogs I read are so fantastic (eg Annie Rhiannon, Sarah Gostrangely - links below) that I just feel like a silly child following their big brother or sister round. Tolerated because it's (blogging) family, but not really wanted and certainly not cool enough to hang out with the big kids.

So I raise my coffee cup to all you amazing bloggers out there, it truly is an art to come up with witty writings on enough of a regular basis to keep people interested.

http://annierhiannon.blogspot.com/

http://sarahgostrangely.blogspot.com/